


A Morning Walk

by pastel (cloudboy)



Category: unOrdinary (Webcomic)
Genre: Gen, One-Shot, Out of Character Arlo (unOrdinary), crosspost, pre-156, pre-s2, tw: mention of rape
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-08
Updated: 2020-02-08
Packaged: 2021-02-28 05:08:31
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,173
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22618393
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cloudboy/pseuds/pastel
Summary: Evie heads out for a walk at dawn and encounters some unexpected company.
Comments: 12
Kudos: 51
Collections: Canon? We don't know her





	A Morning Walk

Blue was just beginning to illuminate the sky from the east when Evie set off into the woods for her morning walk.

The air among the trees was cool and damp, and for all intents and purposes, it was still night beneath the canopy. Activating her ability to light the path ahead, she shuddered briefly, questioning her decision to set out so early. She had expected that at least some light would be filtering through the branches by now, but it was clear that she’d misjudged the distance between her dorm and the trailhead – either that or her average walking speed.

 _You’ll be fine_ , she reassured herself. It was true; there wasn’t much that could harm her out here. Any potentially threatening wild animals were likely too afraid of humans to even approach her, courtesy of experience with higher tiers over the years. Mid-tiers were a more plausible menace, but the sort of behavior that was rampant at Wellston didn’t always fly in the real world, and Evie doubted any of her schoolmates were out and about this early on a Saturday, anyway. Not if they were in their right minds, at least.

Armed with these comforting facts and the light from her hands, it didn’t take long for Evie to relax into the rhythm of her footsteps. The forest remained silent even as faint indigo light began to seep through the treetops (though she suspected it wouldn’t be long before the birds began to wake), and with nothing truly distracting in the corporeal, her mind began to meander along her plans for the day.

Since three of the Four Horsemen and a few powerful in the Horde had been suspended, Evie had had more free time than she knew what to do with. Without a bunch of indolent mid-tiers riding her to complete their assignments in addition to her own, she’d had hours to spare after finishing her homework. Until now, many of her weekends at Wellston had been spent desperately trying to keep up with the extra workload. Perhaps she would spend the day lounging (when was the last time she’d been able to do _that_?), reading fanfiction and surfing the web; if that failed to entertain her, she could always find something to do up in Columbus.

For the next quarter hour or so, Evie’s train of thought traipsed through random topics that for the most part were in no way connected. The world was drenched in deep but gradually paling shades of blue when, despite the temperature rapidly dropping, her introspection was interrupted by the realization that she was growing uncomfortably warm from exertion. Her fingers hesitated at the zipper of her workout jacket. Though Seraphina’s flawless physique had inspired her to impulsively buy a sports-bra-and-leggings set of her own, Evie was otherwise a naturally modest person – so modest, in fact, that even the thought of being so exposed in a dark and empty forest made her uneasy. As to why...well, she herself wasn’t entirely certain.

 _Just take the jacket off, Evie,_ she scolded herself, resolutely pulling down her zipper and tugging her arms from her sleeves. _You’re trying to get more confident, remember? Like Seraphina. If Seraphina can make this work, so can you._

She had barely secured her jacket around her waist when there was a rustle off of the path, ahead to her right. Heart rate already spiking, her eyes darted from the ground in front of her to the source of the sound. A towering silhouette stepped from the trees onto the trail several yards away, and Evie screamed loudly enough to wake any living creature within a mile’s radius from eternal slumber.

In the split second that Evie stumbled backward and landed hard on her rear end, hands shining almost blindingly in a subconscious attempt to frighten off the perceived danger, a pale yellow force field bloomed around the now glowing figure. Dull fear and an unidentifiable, tangled amalgam of emotions settled heavily over her like a cloak. She knew that ability. She’d know that ability anywhere.

“ _Arlo?_ ” she managed to balk, impressively without stammering. _What is he doing out here at this time of day?_ she wondered as she got to her feet. Upon seeing that the woodland banshee – or that was how Evie liked to think she sounded – was in reality a jittery low-tier, Arlo straightened from where he’d instinctively fallen into a sparring stance.

“You _scared_ me,” Evie breathed. A nervous chuckle tacked itself onto the end of her sentence of its own accord. If previous experiences with higher tiers were anything to go by, it wouldn’t be the last one to do so.

“ _You_ scared _me_ ,” Arlo replied, barrier lowering as Evie cautiously approached him at what she could now see was the head of a trail branching from the main path. There was subtle hint of mildly humored relief in his otherwise even voice, but she couldn’t see anything past the vivid, piercing cerulean glow of his eyes to confirm that sentiment. She shivered slightly under his icy, ever-present glower, her heart skipping a beat in her chest.

“What are you doing out here?” Arlo asked without preamble after an awkward silence. He didn’t depower completely until she was within the socially acceptable range for conversation, and though her hands were still alight, the area was observably darker without his daffodil aura. The luminance of it in comparison to her own was a stark – painful, almost – reminder of the vast gulf between their SAGS scores.

“I, uh, I’m just taking a little early morning w-walk,” Evie replied after a beat. The “w” came out as slightly elongated, and she mentally kicked herself for stammering. _Pull it together, Evie. Be confident._

Arlo hummed softly, crossing his arms. At least he didn’t seem irritated by her response. It took her a moment to realize that this was only the second time that they had met, and she wondered if he still remembered who she was; according to Seraphina, he had a week ago. “You’re Evie, right?” he asked, as if eavesdropping on her thoughts.

Evie’s stomach fluttered a little in spite of herself. So he recognized her after all, even despite her different outfit and hairstyle. “Yep, that’s me!” she chirped, though it came out much more apprehensively than was intended. It was probably a good thing; a little timidity never hurt when someone of her caliber encountered a Royal.

Arlo hummed again. “You didn’t strike me as the type of person to be out this early,” he stated bluntly, his tone almost patronizing. Years of this sort of treatment had hardened Evie against the cut of such remarks, but this stung just enough that she lifted her respectfully downward-angled gaze and met his. Starkly contrary to the haughtiness in his voice, his eyes lacked any malice, to Evie’s bewilderment – just curiosity.

“Oh, I...I’m not, usually,” she admitted, swallowing her surprise. “I just had a bit of a nightmare earlier and couldn’t get back to sleep,” her anxiety continued for her. She clamped her mouth shut afterward to prevent anything else embarrassing from slipping out. It wasn’t as if he’d care about her bizarre dream of overdue papers, furious mid-tiers, and furry velociraptors with underdeveloped legs, anyway.

“I see,” he said. Evie couldn’t be certain of the attitude behind it – disinterested or baffled, hopefully, rather than disapproving. Shifting her weight nervously, she looked out into the lightening sky behind Arlo’s head. It wouldn’t be long before the sun rose – no more than half an hour, possibly less. It was beginning to dawn on her that she would really like to get back to the safety of her dorm sooner rather than later, if only to escape this increasingly awkward and quite frankly inexplicable exchange she was having with _the_ _King of Wellston_.

“Well, I, uh...I’m sorry that I, ah, startled you,” she managed, meeting his gaze again meekly. Hopefully, he would take that as a cue to carry on his walk, or whatever it was he was doing out here.

“It’s fine,” Arlo said dismissively, unfolding his arms and slipping his hands into his pockets. Evie was fully prepared to be forced to walk around him as they went their presumably separate ways; while it was hardly the gentlemanly thing of him to do, he outranked her by a huge margin, and Arlo was nothing if not hierarchically strict.

But instead, to her immense confusion, he stepped aside slightly to let her pass.

Evie froze for a brief moment, suddenly terrified that his odd behavior was some sort of test on her knowledge of the social order. It seemed she had no choice but to cross her fingers and take an opportunity where she could. Bowing haltingly and hoping she didn’t look as baffled as she felt, she brushed past him, cringing internally and awaiting a stern rebuke.

To her overwhelming relief, Arlo did nothing of the sort. Instead, he wordlessly fell into step not far behind her. Evie was nearly positive she would glitch from the sheer magnitude of her bemusement. Goosebumps prickled along her bare skin – whether it was because of the cold or her underlying current of fear, she wasn’t sure, but it did remind her that as far as she was concerned, she was half-naked in front of _Arlo_. Seraphina may have had the self-assurance to not be fazed by such a situation, but at the end of the day, Evie was no Seraphina. She was glad Arlo couldn’t see the flush in her cheeks as she retreated back into the safety of her jacket.

It didn’t take long for Evie to figure out that even despite the briskness of the pace she’d taken, Arlo’s strides were much too long for any real distance to be put between them. Outstripping him would require her to break into a jog, and although it wouldn’t have been a false assumption, she didn’t want to look as if she was actively trying to escape him. That, and she was already huffing and puffing.

A prey-like panic began to settle over her. Was he stalking her? There were horrifying stories in the low-tier community, most of them true, of higher tiers raping those that they fancied. It was a fact of life, an inescapable one at that – it had happened to Evie’s own mother, thrice. She’d accepted years ago that she would probably fall victim to at least one such assault over the course of her life, but the prospect of that day being today, alone in the woods with an impossibly powerful god-tier, was more terrifying than she could possibly have imagined.

Evie stopped abruptly and stepped off of the path. She didn’t have to look directly up at Arlo to feel the bemusement radiating from him in nearly palpable waves. “What are you doing?” he asked, the question an equal mix of irritated and confused.

Evie desperately tried to regain control of her breathing, which was threatening to devolve into panic-stricken hyperventilation. “I-I just...your strides are much longer than – than mine, and I d-don’t want to keep you back,” she explained quietly, though not enough so that her voice wasn’t affected by the unquellable quaking that had built in her core.

“I don’t like other people walking behind me,” he replied, so close on the heels of her sentence that it could almost have been considered an interruption. “So you’re fine.”

Evie flinched away from his tone, hugging herself instinctively. She was visibly trembling now, and for all her efforts, the intervals between her breaths continued to shorten.

Arlo was silent for a bit, presumably regarding her and attempting to ascertain the cause of her oddly strong reaction. “Hey,” he finally said. Though his voice still carried the same steady authority it always did, he sounded oddly trepidatious, and Evie risked a glance up at him. His expression was perplexed, as it was before, but there was something else present in his eyes – concern, maybe, or more likely, anxiety.

There was nothing predatory in his mannerisms; he was genuinely flummoxed.

Overwhelming relief washed over Evie like a tidal wave, and a quiet sob pushed its way past her lips.

“Relax, Evie. I’m not going to hurt you,” he said, and though his words were level as always, realization had dawned in his tone. “Calm down.”

“Okay,” she managed to choke past her tears, nodding vigorously and looking out at the trail. She swallowed the snot that had accumulated in her throat. “Okay.”

They both stood silently for a moment as Evie composed herself; aside from her sniffles and the rustles of the waking birds in the trees, all was quiet. It had been ages since she’d had an anxiety attack that severe, and now that the petrifying terror had worn off, humiliation began to throb in the back of her mind. “I’m sorry,” she whispered, her face beginning to burn as she swiped her sleeve under her nose. Offering him a quick bow, she set off, much less briskly, down the path.

This time, he fell into step beside her.

Feeling rather stupid now, Evie finally deactivated her ability, the sky having lightened enough that she could comfortably see without it. Of all the times for a panic to set in, it _had_ to be in front of the King of Wellston. _None of this would have happened if I’d just stayed home_ , she thought ruefully. Perhaps she had been right to be hesitant to leave the safety of her dorm at such an hour; no circumspect low-tier would even consider walking alone in the dark. She, for one, had certainly learned her lesson.

“What was that all about?” Arlo asked abruptly, with all his usual tact. Evie peeked up at him. He didn’t look angry – not any more than usual, at least – but he did look impatient, and she wasn’t about to keep him waiting for an answer. “Ah, I’m sorry,” she said sheepishly, breaking away from his gaze and staring out into the dim woods. “This...this guy, this mid-tier, broke into our house around two in the morning, when I was eleven, and...”

Evie hesitated, swallowing the bitter lump that always rose in her throat when she recalled that night. Roland was the only person she had trusted with this story; without a doubt, it was her darkest secret. Sharing it with Arlo, a virtual stranger, should by all accounts have felt extremely violative. But somehow, it didn’t, as if she hadn’t completely gotten it off her chest in the first place – even years later.

“And?” Arlo prodded, much more gently than before (though that was a relative term).

Evie blew out. There was no turning back now. “And he raped my mom in front of me and my little brother,” she finished, shuddering involuntarily. She shook her head resolutely, as if subconsciously trying to rid her mind of the memory. All the same, it felt as if a horrible burden had been lifted from her shoulders; in a turn of events she could never have possibly foreseen, she was peculiarly glad that he had asked.

“I’m sorry,” he said after a contemplative silence. It was a clearly automatic response, but even so, Evie could detect a note of sincerity in it. Frankly, it was more than she ever would have expected from a god-tier like Arlo.

“Oh, you – you don’t have to be,” Evie said with a stray sniffle, shrugging. “It happens to us low-tiers all the time. But...yeah, that’s why I freaked out. I-I still have PTSD from it, I guess.”

“You informed the authorities, of course,” Arlo said matter-of-factly, as if any other course of action was nothing short of ludicrous. He sounded so sure of himself that Evie wasn’t certain how to tell him that they had not, in fact, taken their case to court. A close friend of her mother’s had gone that route only to learn, hundreds of thousands in wasted money later, that the authorities didn’t care what happened to low-tiers. They were on their own. “Ummm...” she began slowly, “we...didn’t, actually.”

“Oh?” Now he sounded disapproving, and Evie hazarded a glance up at him. He was looking down his nose at her, eyes clouded with irritation. “Why not?”

Evie was beginning to regret answering him so candidly. He was a god-tier; it only made sense that his head would be stuck in the clouds. No matter how delicately or forcefully she worded her reasoning or the experiences behind it, Arlo would never fully grasp what she was saying – he never could.

 _Be confident_ , she reminded herself, and despite how well that mindset had served her earlier, she decided it was worth another shot. She took a deep breath. “Be-because...the same thing happened to my mom’s best friend, and they didn’t do anything about it.”

Evie was almost certain that she had unintentionally raised her voice, but if she had, Arlo didn’t react. Instead, he looked away, heaving a sigh so deep that she was certain it had risen from the darkest depths of his soul. Something else was on his mind, and if the sangria smudges under his eyes were anything to go by, it had been for quite some time. A wave of instinctive compassion rolled over her, even as she found herself marveling that god-tiers even _had_ problems.

“Where are you from?” Arlo asked unexpectedly, his voice bouncing back to its usual timbre.

Mild exasperation suddenly replaced with another generous helping of confusion, Evie looked back up at him. He’d clearly stowed whatever had been troubling him away to mull over later, and reminiscent of earlier, he seemed genuinely curious.

“Uh...Portland?” she finally replied, though it came out more like a question than a response.

“Portland...?”

Right – there was apparently a Portland in Maine as well. “Oh, right, sorry. Portland, _Oregon._ ”

He nodded, as if in approval. “My family owns a cabin not far from Mount Hood.”

That was no surprise; Evie had never heard of a poor, or even middle-class, god-tier. Still thoroughly bemused by his oddly conversational mood, she nodded. “Really? That, uh, that must be nice.”

“You _have_ been to Mount Hood, right?” Already, he sounded incredulous, and Evie didn’t have the pluck to inform him that she had never visited in the fashion he was probably referring to – skiing or snowboarding or whatever it was rich people did when they hiked mountains. “Yeah, we’ve hiked to the summit,” she settled on saying instead, looking down at her shoes.

Arlo hummed, sounding impressed.

Evie swallowed and looked back up at him, only half to observe his reaction to the question she was about to ask. His features were arranged quite pleasantly, she had to admit, and his face had a very proverbially similar effect to a magnet. “Uh, so, wh...where are _you_ from?”

Arlo’s eyes snapped over to her, and for a moment, she feared she might have angered him. She was relieved to note that he didn’t look vexed – more surprised, likely at the fact that she’d gathered the courage to inquire at all. “I grew up in Toulouse, in France, until I was seven,” he replied at length. “But I’ve lived in Paradise Valley, Arizona, ever since.”

Evie had no clue where either of those places were respective to their countries on the world map in her mind, but “Paradise Valley” sounded like exactly the sort of place a god-tier would call home. If she were positive that Arlo wouldn’t have been offended, she probably would have said as much.

Several more minutes passed of spotty (and quite frankly awkward) back-and-forth before a comfortable flow of conversation was established. Evie was surprised at how fluidly things went afterward. It didn’t take long for her to deduce that the only reason Arlo was talking to her at all was because he was lonely, and likely looking for a distraction from is still-unexplained stressor. But in spite of himself, he seemed genuinely curious about life as a low-tier, peppering in a sometimes overwhelming number of questions related to the topic. Evie surmised that he had always wondered, but because of the exorbitant social standards society placed on him due to his rank, he’d never had the chance to ask.

She, for one, was more than happy to indulge him; it was unexpectedly therapeutic to explain her daily fears and struggles to someone completely oblivious. Despite her earlier misgivings, she even grew to sincerely enjoy his company, and it became increasingly disheartening to think that this was realistically the only time she’d have this opportunity.

Though Arlo almost certainly knew more about her by the end of their walk than vice versa, Evie still recognized that she knew Arlo better than anyone of her status likely ever would. Even in a more relaxed state, his voice only marginally wavered from its typical, cavalier quality, and she came to understand that that was just how he’d learned to speak. Somehow, in combination with his naturally cool energy, its baritone cadence actually helped soothe her reflexive fretfulness; before long, she even managed to speak to him without tripping over her words. For someone as jittery as she was, this was quite an achievement, especially taking into consideration the fact that she was nearly five levels below and a foot shorter than him. On the contrary, she almost came to find safety in his presence, reminiscent of when she’d “introduced” him to Hower.

Returning to her daily, fear-ridden routine that coming Monday, she unhappily realized, would be nigh painful after experiencing this foreign but welcome sense of security.

The sun was well above the horizon by the time the two of them reached the end of the trail, and they had lapsed into an agreeable silence. Arlo paused at the boundary where the earth turned to sidewalk and led past Wellston, which lay a few hundred yards ahead. A student was visible walking past the gate, and he tensed so suddenly it was almost physically uncomfortable. Evie stopped a step ahead of him and looked back, mildly confused as to his sudden shift in energy. He was eyeing Wellston contemplatively, trademark scowl set firmly on his face, and then he shifted his gaze down to her.

Something clicked inside as she studied his expression, and she shook her head as he opened his mouth. “I know,” she said, much more gently than the words had been spoken in her mind.

Arlo looked briefly surprised, but then he dipped his head in a slow nod, smiling ever so slightly in what Evie could only assume was relief that she understood where he was coming from. If she were in Arlo’s position, she probably wouldn’t want to be seen walking with one of the weakest students at Wellston, either. He had a reputation to uphold, after all, and an onerous one at that. It stung – more than just a little, if she were to be honest with herself – but so did life, and she wasn’t about to tarnish his public image in an attempt to get around that inevitability. He didn’t need to tell her to keep quiet; she’d do it of her own accord.

Conjuring all the confidence she could muster, Evie managed a soft smile. “See you around, Arlo.”

To her immense surprise, he returned it with another minute one of his own. “See you around, Evie,” he replied, and unless she was hearing things, there was a bit of a laugh in his voice. He gestured ahead. “Ladies first.”

There was... _something_ in that moment, something about his oxymoronically soft but flinty expression, the way the sunbeams caught in his faux-blonde waves as they filtered through the canopy, the impossibly, gorgeously deep ocean blue of his eyes. Evie felt a stab of sudden, unexpected homesickness – or at least, it primarily resembled homesickness. She hadn’t even spent an hour with Arlo, and yet somehow, she already had the overwhelming sense that she would miss him, or at least this version of him.

Flustered, she offered him a respectful bow and set off down the sidewalk ahead, not once looking back.

It occurred to Evie, as she trekked back to her dormitory, that if she and Arlo had encountered anyone else who attended Wellston on the trail, he would probably have walked ahead and pretended that he didn’t know her; his attitude toward her on Monday, she knew without a doubt, would be the same as it had always been. Ultimately, in all likelihood, nothing would change between them.

Kicking her shoes off and flopping down on her bed, she closed her eyes and desperately tried to untangle the knot of emotions swirling in the pit of her stomach. Never in a million years would she have expected this to be the outcome of leaving on such an early walk.

But maybe somehow, she thought, warmth rising in her chest, it hadn’t been such a bad idea after all. ♥

**Author's Note:**

> SAGS, btw, stands for "Standard Ability Gauging System," and I completely pulled it out of my ass.
> 
> (Crossposted on Wattpad.)


End file.
